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Alpha 5
Alpha 5 (Alpha for short) was the robotic assistant to the rangers during Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and Power Rangers Zeo. Alpha was an extremely important factor in the Power Rangers' battle against evil and acted as a secondary mentor to them, under his friend, the wise sage Zordon of Eltar. Alpha would use the exclamation "Ai yi yi" in moments which invoked emotions of any kind, from panic to elation (most commonly panic); in more extreme situations, the exclamation could contain four "yi"'s, five "yi"'s or, in rare cases, six or seven "yi"'s; this has become a well-known catchphrase for most of the Alpha robots. He worked in the Command Center most of the time, only getting out on a few occasions, and almost always obeyed every command and order that Zordon issued. Character History Alpha was a fully-sentient multifunctional automaton robot built by King Lexian on the planet Edenoi; his memory banks contain many fond memories of that planet, but we never see those memories. He is the second Alpha automaton to be in the service of Zordon, succeeding Alpha 4. Alpha 5 assisted Zordon in the creation of the original Power Rangers as well as the Command Center. Alpha was an advisor, mechanic, tech-wizard, and overall friend to the Power Rangers from Mighty Morphin leading up to Power Rangers: Turbo. Alpha was dearly loved by the Rangers and Zordon, but sometimes they shut him out and occasionally teased him (as he misunderstands jokes, in the typical manner of a young child). His despair and need for the love of Zordon and the Rangers only came up to the surface when he was turned evil by Finster's personality-altering disc. In Power Rangers: Turbo, when the opportunity presented itself, Alpha 5 left with Zordon to the planet Eltar and was replaced by Alpha 6. His last appearance is in the episode Passing the Torch, where he and Zordon returned to witness the veteran rangers passing on their powers, and oddly, he is in his old robot suit. He's not been seen or heard of since. Wild Force writer Amit Bhaumik has said that he takes the view that Alpha was murdered in the battle when Dark Specter invaded the planet Eltar, but there is no official confirmation. Notes Portrayal Alpha 5 was voiced by Richard Steven Horvitz. As a homage to Alpha 5, the character Alpha 7 that appears in the anniversary special Forever Red has the same voice actor. The identity of Alpha's voice actor remained a mystery for several years because Richard was credited under a different name at the time for most of the series; Alpha's Magical Christmas credits him under his actual name. Richard spells out the first part of Alpha 5's catchphrase as "ai" (like the Japanese word for love) when he does autographs for fans; when asked to do his voice he often says "Ai yi yi, Zordon, the Power Rangers are in trouble!".https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qB26ZnJhDQIn fact, in another recent interview, Richard has confirmed that he himself came up with "ai yi yi" as Alpha 5's signature line when filming for Day of the Dumpster began.Interview with the man behind Alpha 5's voice Behind the Scenes *On Alpha's chest was a yellow stylized lightning bolt similar to the Power Rangers' stylized lightning bolt symbol but inverted. His head is always in the shape of a golden flying disc with a red visor on the front that flashes when he is speaking. *"Alpha" (Greek: άλφα) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet, represented by the symbol A in uppercase, and α in lowercase. In the system of Greek numerals, Alpha has a value of 1. According to Etymologicum Magnum, alpha was derived from álphō (άλφω) "to invent": thus alpha is the "first invented letter." The closest attested words are alphánō (αλφάνω) "I yield, produce"4 and the noun derived from it, alphē (αλφή) "produce, gain." Alpha, both as a symbol and term, is used to refer to or describe a variety of things, including the first or most significant occurrence of something. *In keeping with his childlike nature, Alpha was occasionally seen holding a teddy bear with a metallic head somewhat resembling his own. An episode of Zeo, Inner Spirit, had him coming out of a room in the Power Chamber (presumably a bedroom for him) wearing a nightcap (like Somnibot's but with a metal circle on it instead of a fuzzy ball) while keeping this teddy bear in that room. The teddy bear appeared on two occasions; the first was during the earthquake following Rita's release, and the second was during Jason's battle with King Sphinx. It is unknown officially who gave him this teddy bear or when it was given to him. *The episode Clean-Up Club reveals that Alpha is unlike most robots on the fact that he can feel physical pain, as Alpha groans in pain when he falls over after being wrapped in computer readout paper. This occurs again in Island of Illusion during the first Command Center scene, where Alpha is repeatedly electrocuted by the control consoles. *Alpha's programmed gender (male) was confirmed by Trini Kwan in The Wanna-Be Ranger, though it was confirmed several times before this. *In the VHS Power Rangers special, Alpha's Magical Christmas, Alpha sings Christmas carols with a large group of children that are mysteriously teleported away from their homes to the Command Center. Some of the songs are: ** Oh Christmas Tree ** Good King Wenceslas ** Here We Come A-Caroling ** Jingle Bells ** Deck the Halls ** Up on the Housetop ** Silent Night. **He also sings We Wish You A Merry Christmas with Kimberly Hart (Amy Jo Johnson), Billy Cranston (David Yost), and Thomas Oliver (Jason David Frank) who mysteriously is shown throughout the special as both the Green and White Rangers. Some of the songs have a few of Alpha's special "ai yi yi" touch-ups. *Alpha was succeeded by Alpha 6 and Alpha 7. *In one episode of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, he became evil by the forceful insertion of a disk containing a computer virus that rapidly spread into his systems. While on the side of the forces of evil, he banished Zordon and sent the Rangers to the Spectre Theater. Billy fortunately removed the disk and Alpha instantly returned to normal. However, while evil, Alpha expressed his immense jealousy and envy of the Rangers, saying that they are getting all the glory and fighting the monsters instead of him. The reason why he acts this way while he's turned evil is because they frequently leave him alone to go battle Rita and Zedd's forces, as implied in The Wanna-Be Ranger and confirmed by Alpha himself in the non-canon holiday special Alpha's Magical Christmas, and this could be said to serve as his motivation for turning evil even though we never saw an actual all-out conversion take place (Finster just puts a disc into Alpha's badge-shaped disc drive, rather than him being brought before Rita and Zedd, infused with evil energy and having his memories manipulated in some fashion). However, since most of Alpha's scenes are comprised of stock footage, he does not engage the Rangers in battle himself to finally finish them off. *In the episode Teamwork, Alpha made an attempt at learning how to dance Zack's dancing/fighting style, hip hop kido. He didn't do very well, as he kept causing static in the communicators. *In the Green with Evil miniseries, Alpha was given a virus by the Green Ranger and ended up feeling weak. He was later turned off by the Green Ranger, but his back-up system kicked in. He then orders the computer to activate a force field around the Ranger. He serves as the team's leader in Zordon's absence. *In the episode Life's a Masquerade, Alpha's desire to "party" with the Rangers caused him to leave the Command Center temporarily and attend a costume party with them, using his robotic body as a "disguise" of sorts. At the end of the episode, he won first prize for his "costume", and had a lot of ladies flirting with him. In another episode, Alpha again teleported down to a Halloween party in Angel Grove, but we never see him go there. *In Power Rangers S.P.D., a planet named "Alpha 5" is mentioned; however, this planet may or may not have a connection to Alpha himself, other than the name. *Alpha may be secretly envious of the Power Rangers. In the episode The Wedding, when Zordon referred to the Rangers as Alpha's friends, while consumed with his inner jealousy evil Alpha laughed at the idea, since the Rangers were always teleporting here and there, having all the fun and getting all the glory, but now he would be famous for destroying the Rangers as revenge for shutting him out and not being there when he needed them the most. He even says he would go down in history as the one that terminated them once and for all. *Alpha has a secret wish to spend time with other fellow robots, as shown in Trust In Me when talking about the possibilities of making Defector a member of their team. When he noticed the Rangers were looking at him funny, he then corrected himself by saying "no offense, Rangers". See Also *Tensou, the robotic assistant of Gosei who serves a similar role to Alpha 5 in Power Rangers Megaforce. *Alpha 6 *Alpha 7 *Circuit, the robotic assistant of the Time Force who serves a similar role and personality to Alpha 5 in Power Rangers Time Force *Datas, Tensou's Sentai counterpart. External links * Alpha 5 Online (now defunct, archived by Wayback Machine) de: Alpha 5 Category:Mighty Morphin Category:Zeo Category:Turbo Category:Robotic PR Allies Category:Alpha Series